CheckDispute Guides

An unfamiliar creditor name is not always an unfamiliar debt CheckDispute · Sources checked September 20, 2026 A creditor name you do not recognize on your credit report usually has an ordinary explanation: accounts get sold, debts get placed with third-party collectors, and retail store cards commonly report under the issuing bank's name instead of the store's. The CFPB's first advice is to contact the company and learn more before disputing — the investigation comes before the label. Why would someone else's name show up on my credit report? Two families of explanations, one routine and one serious. The routine one: the CFPB explains that creditors may sell accounts or use a third-party collection company , so a debt you know can appear under a name you do not. Retail cards are the classic case — they commonly report under the bank that issued the card, not the store on the front of it. The serious one: information can genuinely belong to another person. The ...

Authorized user or joint owner: checking account responsibility CheckDispute · Sources checked September 20, 2026 Your credit report already records a role on every account — owner, joint owner, or authorized user — and the role matters because it states who is responsible for the debt. Being an authorized user generally does not obligate you to pay. If the report calls you the owner of an account you only had permission to use, that is a named error category you can check and dispute. Here is how. Can creditors go after authorized users? Generally no. The CFPB states plainly that being an authorized user does not obligate you to pay the debt — the authorized user can make charges, but the obligation to repay belongs to the account holder. The same CFPB guidance covers the harder case: if a collector insists you co-signed an account you believe you did not, you may ask the collector for evidence — such as a copy of a contract you signed. And credit card issuers usually report aut...

Credit limit reported incorrectly: a review guide CheckDispute · Sources checked September 20, 2026 A wrong credit limit on your report is a data-management error in the CFPB's own classification, and the document that settles it is your cardholder agreement or a dated statement — not the report itself. The limit is furnished information, so the dispute runs to the credit reporting company and to the issuer that reported it. Here is the procedure, field by field. What are the three most common credit report errors? The CFPB's own list groups them into three categories, and it is worth knowing which one a limit falls into. The bureau's guidance on common credit report errors names them: identity errors (information belonging to someone else, including a mixed file), incorrect reporting of account status (a closed account shown as open, a payment marked late that was not), and data management errors — which is where an incorrect current balance and an incorrect cred...

A closed account still has a balance: what to check CheckDispute · Sources checked September 20, 2026 A closed account can legitimately show a balance, because closing an account and paying it off are two different events — interest generally keeps accruing until the issuer receives your payment. The reportable error is not the balance; it is the status. Here is which fields to compare, and what a mismatch does and does not establish. Why is my closed account still showing on my credit report? Because closing an account does not remove it. The CFPB explains that positive payment history may be reported after a loan is paid off and even after the account is closed, while most negative information can be reported for up to seven years. A closed account staying on your report is the normal case, not a problem to fix. What is worth checking is whether the report describes the closure correctly. A credit report's account entries include the dates the account was opened and closed,...

Reported balance versus past-due balance CheckDispute · Sources checked September 20, 2026 A reported balance is the dollar figure the company that services your account sent to the credit reporting company. A past-due amount is a status: money the report says was owed and unpaid after a due date. They are different fields, and the CFPB puts them in different error categories — which means you check each one against a different document. Here is which document settles which. What does "reported balance" mean? A credit report's account entries include the credit limit or amount, the account balance, the payment history, the dates the account was opened and closed, and the creditor's name, according to the CFPB's explanation of what a credit report contains . The reported balance is the account-balance field, and the company that supplied it is called a furnisher — your bank, your card issuer, your lender. One honest limit before anything else: the report doe...